Category: Brewing History

This week, we are spotlighting one of Canada’s formidable female brewers: Susannah Oland. Today, you might recognize her beer under the name Moosehead!

Susannah Oland. Image from Moosehead.ca

But let’s go back: way back. In 1865, Susannah emigrated from England to Canada with her husband John and their nine children. Upon arriving in Nova Scotia, John worked for the railway, while Susannah minded their children and brewed her signature Brown October Ale in the backyard. Impressed by her brew, friends encouraged the Olands to go into business, and by 1867, John and Susannah had established The Army and Navy Brewery. Situated on twelve acres in Turtle Cove, on the east side of the Halifax harbour, they ran a brisk business – local soldiers and sailors proved dependable customers, with a definite taste for Susannah’s ale!

However, tragedy struck just three years later. In 1870, John died in a riding accident, leaving Susannah to raise their children alone. Financial difficulties left her no choice but to sell the majority of shares in The Army and Navy Brewery, thus losing control temporarily. However, Susannah possessed both determination and solid business sense. Upon receiving an inheritance from a family member in 1877, she returned to the beer world by forming a brewery of her own: S. Oland, Sons and Co. (the use of her initial was another canny business move – she wanted to hide the fact that a woman ran the brewery!).

1871 census. Notice that Susannah is listed as “Widowed,” and it’s her sons who are “Brewers.”

1881 census: much the same story.

As a complete sidebar, it looks like her son John got into a spot of trouble: he voted in his deceased father’s place during a local (and hotly contested) election…but he was, unfortunately, underage at the time of voting (check out the 1871 census: he wouldn’t have been 21 at the time). However, it seems that nothing came of it.

A close local election was held in Halifax (“The Globe,” Nov 11, 1870).

Besides John’s voting issues, the Olands’ brewery survived two fires, and by the time Susannah died in 1886, her sons had become proficient brewers in their own right. After her death, her sons John Jr., Conrad, and George took over the brewery, renaming it the Maritime Malting and Brewing Co. It was not the last time the name would be changed, nor the last tragedy. The brewery survived the Halifax Explosion in 1917, Prohibition, and two World Wars, adopting several new monikers along the way. It finally became Moosehead Breweries Ltd in 1947, after the popularity of its Moosehead Pale Ale.

Through it all, the Oland family remained; they’re currently on their sixth generation! Where Sleeman, Molson, Labatt, and the others have passed into international partnership, Moosehead alone remains wholly Canadian. A fitting legacy for a fine brewmistress!

When I was in the Black Creek Brewery, I often received the question, “Did Victorians drink beer because the water was unsafe?” I’d like to spend some time answering that question.

The short answer is, “In Toronto, the water was often unsafe, but that didn’t actually link to beer consumption very much.”

Let’s start at the beginning.

Toronto, 1850s-1860s. Yes, indeed, the water is not terribly safe to drink. Until the 1870s, the drinking water supply was handled by private companies. As you can imagine, they were mostly concerned with profits, and so sometimes let matters of safety slide. Most drinking water came from private wells, which was fine unless they got contaminated. Animals were slaughtered throughout the city streets, and their offal tossed in the sewers. Animals’ manure ended up in the sewers as well. So did untreated human waste. And where did these sewers empty?

“The water used in Toronto is a byword through the Province. Thick and cloudy with feculence, it is unfit for human use until purified. No one who can possibly afford it should be without a filter to strain the impurities they are compelled to drink. Crystal clearness instead of yellow decoction of dead plants and animals, must be a blessing to any one”

The Globe, November 2, 1857.

Well, then.

So, yes. In 1860s Toronto, the water was not always safe to drink.

However.

Remember that germ theory was still developing at this time. In England, Dr. John Snow had established a connection between cholera and contaminated water in 1848, but his work wasn’t entirely accepted until later in the century. Louis Pasteur’s experiments in killing bacteria through heat (i.e. pasteurization) didn’t get rolling until the early 1860s. Obviously, Victorians linked filth and sickness. They knew the water wasn’t safe. They likely didn’t entirely realize the mechanism of why.

In fact, The Globe provides helpful tips on cholera prevention:

“Make a city clean; purge it from every foul smell, bury its reeking corruption, cleanse its drains permit no stagnant cess-pools; make it in fact what decency and common comfort demand, and cholera will pass along our streets harmless…”

The Globe, November 2, 1857.

Get rid of the ick; you won’t get sick!

An 1866 article is still preoccupied with the water quality—it suggests that allowing a more abundant supply might help flush the city’s pipes and keep everything cleaner. However, it also has good advice for disinfecting water.

Namely, these include solutions of hypochlorite of soda, lime, and “Condy’s fluid” (solution of alkaline manganates and permanganates—you could drink it, or use it like Windex!). These solutions could be poured into cess-pools and chamber-pots. Cooking/drinking water ought to be filtered through charcoal; you could burn a little wood in your hearth at night to encourage air flow.

Still sick? Placing iodine in a box or “in the ornamental cases on the mantle or shelf of a room” was thought to disinfect it. They suggest taking 8-10 grains of sulphite of magnesia when cholera is rampant. And most importantly, protecting one’s self from waterborne diseases by practicing “perfect sobriety” and avoiding all employments which “exhaust nervous energy.”

In other words…no one is suggesting an alternative to water. They’re trying to find ways to make it as safe as possible. In fact, the exhortation for sobriety (immorality = disease, obviously) directly contradicts any notion of drinking beer in place of water.

Indeed, there are calls from this time period for more drinking water. See these letters to the Editor talking about the joys of public drinking fountains—so people can have an alternative to beer.

The Globe, July 6, 1863

The Globe, October 24, 1862

Look, beer tastes nice. It has calories. Small beer gives a mild buzz (which Victorians assumed was a stimulant effect). Given the choice—without my modern knowledge of health and the effects of alcohol—I’d probably choose the beer too.

So the water in mid-Victorian Toronto wasn’t always safe. But the response does not seem to have been, “Break out the beer.” Rather, the city seems to have reacted by trying to make the water supply safer. Their beer consumptions seems driven by reasons other than health concerns. As they say in the sciences, “Correlation does not equal causation.”

As some may recall, I took a number of online beer knowledge tests a while back. While that was thoroughly enjoyable, I wanted to try my hand at making a beer test of my own. But this one is more about testing personality. And it’s entirely for fun.

d) There is endless opportunity for creativity and fine craft, and it’s fun to try new styles with friends.

RESULTS

Mostly A’s:

You are Mesopotamian/Sumerian Brewing! Starting from around 3500 BCE, your beer is a gift from the gods. As such, most of your beer is brewed by priestesses—particularly of the goddess Ninkasi. Thick and porridge-like, your beer is flavoured with honey and fruits, and drunk through straws!

Mostly B’s:

You are Medieval Brewing! Your beer is still largely a cottage industry: for the most part, it’s made by women, though plenty of monasteries have gotten into the act, too. The spent grains get filtered out, so your beer isn’t nearly as thick as it was millennia ago. Some Germanic countries are using hops to flavour their beer, but gruit—a mix of different herbs—is your beer’s defining feature!

Mostly C’s:

You are Victorian Brewing! You’re quite content to use hops—you know that they help prevent beer spoiling, which is useful in the interconnected trade network developing across the globe. Some of your most popular styles include brown ales and porters, though pale ales are gaining traction. Beer is still an important part of people’s daily diet…though Temperance advocates are starting promoting abstinence from alcohol.

Mostly D’s:

You are Modern Brewing! You have so much variety in your beers! Proliferating craft breweries are keen to explore unique flavour profiles and take risks, focusing on quality ingredients and top-notch craft. People of all backgrounds enjoy your beers (assuming they’re of legal drinking age) and with new microbreweries opening constantly, it’s a safe bet they’ll never get bored.

In the past, I was occasionally asked if common drinks like “root beer” and “ginger ale” were ever alcoholic—this question usually arose when Ed rolled out our Ginger Beer in June. The short answer is…yes! Several popular modern sodas like root beer, ginger ale, and birch beer (okay, maybe that one’s less common) had their origins in Victorian beers!

Since we’ve talked about ginger ale a while back, I wanted to explore root beer a little.

Root beer is a beverage traditionally made with sassafras roots and/or sarsaparilla as its main flavouring agent. The Indigenous populations of North America were making sassafras-based beverages long before European contact, using it to treat various ailments from wounds to fevers. Unsurprisingly, then, when “root beer” began to be sold through the mid-nineteenth century, it was touted as a healthful drink.

The sassafras tree grows from southern Ontario right to the southern United States! (courtesy: Wikimedia Commons)

(Point of interest: sassafras does contain an oil called safrole that can lead to liver damage and cancer. It’s been banned by the US Food and Drug Administration since 1960—root beer today is sometimes made with sassafras extract that’s had the safrole removed, but more commonly with extracts from wintergreen and black birch bark.)

Pharmacist Charles Elmer Hires was the first person to make a commercial brand of root beer—though being a teetotaller, he really would’ve preferred to call it “root tea.” And he wouldn’t have been far off the mark, either—though root beer can be fermented, most traditional recipes barely get to 2% ABV. However, when he debuted his drink at the 1876 Philadelphia Centennial Exposition, he wanted to attract customers among the local coal miners.

Thus, with (I’m sure) some regret, he sold his product as “root beer.” But not to worry—I’m equally sure he would’ve been cheered by a proliferation of non-alcoholic root beers. Indeed, they were very popular during the United States’ Prohibition years.

Looking this over, it’s not surprising root beer had such a low alcohol content. Remember, alcohol is what happens when yeast metabolizes fermentable sugars. With only a little bran (hard to break down) and molasses, there’s just not much to work with in this recipe!

But I was intrigued by a) the lack of sassafras, and b) the mention of “Indigenous bitters.” A little more digging unearthed this advertisement in the May 2, 1890 edition of The Québec Daily Telegraph.

Given the description of “a combination…of a large number of roots and barks,” and the assertion that “INDIGENOUS BITTERS never fail to afford prompt relief, and most frequently a perfect cure,” I think we’ve found our star player! Clearly, this was another incarnation of root beer as a health drink.

(I was also delighted to see that—sure enough—these “Indigenous bitters” are sold in “25cts boxes only.” Just like the recipe says!)

Obviously, root beer today is very different—in ingredients, method, and purpose. But as you raise a frosty mug, you can contemplate its Victorian predecessors!

We’re celebrating a very special birthday this weekend! That’s right, Canada’s 150th anniversary is this Saturday! And to celebrate, Black Creek Pioneer Village is putting on one heck of a party!

Whoo!

(As a point of interest, it was my birthday yesterday, but that’s neither here nor there.)

Our Canada Day celebrations last from Saturday, July 1st until Monday, July 3rd. On July 1st, 2017— free admission for all! That’s right! Everyone! Marvel at magicians, tumblers, and jugglers, learn what was trending in 1867 (#Spiritualism? #PteriodomaniacLife?), and of course, experience the life as it was on that first day under the Constitution Act.

And of course, the Black Creek Brewery is celebrating as well! Drop by to taste a special birthday brew. Can’t wait until Saturday? Well, in honour of our 150th anniversary, here are 15 Interesting Facts about Beer from the last 150 Years

The first brewery in Canada was Québec City’s La Brasseries due Roy, established in 1668 by New France Intendant Jean Talon.

At the time of Confederation, Toronto had about 300 taverns and a population of ~45,000. That’s nearly 150 people per tavern! Today, Toronto has ~950 bars and a population of 2,615,000. That’s over 2750 people per bar! (It gets a little better when you factor in 6980 establishments recorded by DineSafe as “restaurants” or “cocktail bars”—more like 310 people per “establishment where one could theoretically order a drink”).

Today, the only Canadian-owned major brewery is Moosehead, established in 1867.

The 1864 Dunkin Act gave townships in Ontario an option to vote on going dry. Toronto didn’t get around to holding a vote until 1877. It voted to stay wet.

The Canada Malting Silos down by Harbourfront were built in 1928. According to Wikipedia, their “stark functionalism…was an early influence on modernist architecture.”

In 1934, John Sackville Labatt (yes, son of that John Labatt) became an early Canadian kidnapping victim. His kidnappers held him captive for three days, demanding $150,000. They eventually panicked and released him, but sadly, Labatt remained a recluse for the rest of his life.

In the 1880s, a hop picker was paid around 30 cents per box of hops (about 13 lbs of hops). A really good picker could harvest two boxes each day.

Much early planning for the 1837 Upper Canada Rebellion was done in John Doel’s brewery.

The first free school in Toronto was built in 1848—by brewer Enoch Turner. You can still visit it today!

At Confederation, roughly 10% of Toronto’s licensed tavern-keepers were female.

The Industry Standard Bottle—also known as the “stubby”—was first adopted in 1962 and finally faded from use in 1984.

There was no real legal drinking age in the 1800s. By the 1960s, it was 21 in Ontario. Then in 1971, it dropped to 18, before settling at 19 years of age in 1979.

From 1867 to now, beer’s main ingredients have not changed: barley, hops, water, and yeast!

He’s probably one of Canada’s most famous drunkards, which is a fact that seems to get bandied about a lot. Of course, it’s worth pointing out that Sir John A. wasn’t perpetually drunk. No, he went on binges. Sometimes, he was quick, calculating, and stone-cold sober—and sometimes, the Governor-General was writing letters explaining that they weren’t entirely sure where the erstwhile politician was.

There are a few anecdotes that always get retold. In one, Macdonald is notably…ah, “unwell” on the campaign trail (likely a by-election). During the debate, he vomits. When his opponent points this out, he responds, ““I get sick…not because of drink [but because] I am forced to listen to the ranting of my honourable opponent.”

In June 1866, the Fenian Brotherhood launched an invasion into Canada from Buffalo. The Battle of Ridgeway was the first battle fought on Canadian soil, led by Canadian officers, and also marks the last foreign invasion in Ontario. At the time, Sir John A. was the Minister of Militia and Defence. So of course, news of the attack went straight to him.

And…he was passed out drunk.

Bills failed and languished. Telegrams went unanswered. International relations could be embarrassing at best and dangerous at worst—during the London Conference that sought final British approval before Confederation, Sir John A. nearly set himself and his hotel room on fire when a candle tipped over while he slept.

(In fairness, he might not have been drunk that time—but his fondness for the Athenaeum Club and its libations is well-known.)

The Globe attacked his habit viciously. In fact, one article was so eloquent, I wanted to show a larger extract:

“The truth is that the prime minister has again yielded to the temptation of drink, and has again rendered himself incapable of attending to his duties at a most critical period of affairs. It would almost seem that Sir John A. Macdonald choose those seasons when his vice is calculated to bring the greatest disgrace upon himself and upon the country.

His pitiable condition during the Fenian raid when telegram after telegram was left unanswered because he was in such a state of intoxication that he could not comprehend them, was a matter which would have brought severe retribution upon a Minister in England; his disgraceful condition during the visit of Prince Arthur will long be remembered to the discredit of Canada; and now when every energy should be devoted to the affairs of the North-West…Sir John A. Macdonald again flies to the bottle.

It is really an outrage to the country. The spectacle of the Prime Minister staggering into the refreshment room of the House, and being taken out thence first by one colleague and then by another, or babbling in maudlin intoxication in a hotel bar-room, is a thing to which no other country would submit for an hour. We are not a nation of drunkards, and we have a right to expect that men occupying the most exalted position their country can bestow upon them shall, at least, behave with decorum.”

The Globe: April 30, 1870.

The Globe’s editor George Brown was one of Macdonald’s bitterest rivals, which may explain some of the acerbity, but clearly, there was genuine upset at his functional alcoholism. Macdonald himself shrugged off such criticisms: “…the people would prefer John A. drunk to George Brown sober.”

1873 political cartoon. Note the bottle in his back pocket.

Would they, though? The fact that Macdonald managed to accomplish as much as he did in spite of his alcoholism makes one wonder—what if he hadn’t had it? How might Canada look today? Would he have proven a more able leader, or would there simply have been more Pacific Scandals and exclusionary policies towards Asian and Indigenous peoples?

It’s impossible to say, of course. “Coulda, woulda, shoulda” history is probably best left to thought experiments. I’ll end by saying that Macdonald’s second wife Susan Agnes Bernard is largely credited with fighting Macdonald’s demons—biographer Richard J Gwyn claims she literally kept him alive long enough to see the new nation through its formative years.

So—I think John A. has had plenty of glasses raised to him over the years. If you must toast, perhaps consider toasting Susan Bernard.

I was once explaining to some visitors from overseas how Canada became a country. “There was no war, or revolution, or anything like that,” quoth I. “It was more…like when an adult child moves out of the basement, and into their own place.”

I still stand by the gist of that analogy, though of course, it was rather more complicated than that. With the 150th anniversary of Confederation nigh, let’s look at the first step on the road—and of course, it does involve alcohol.

Yay!

So it’s 1864. Organizers are planning the Charlottetown Conference: Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island are all sending delegates to discuss the possibility of uniting these three Atlantic colonies into one.

Not so fast!

Depending on which source you read, a delegation from the Province of Canada more-or-less invited itself…or Governor General Monck did “ask” if they might also attend. In any case, in September 1864, the Canadians duly turned up in PEI—a formidable crew including John A. MacDonald and George Brown from Upper Canada, and George-Étienne Cartier, Alexander Galt, and Thomas D’Arcy McGee representing Lower Canada. Hilariously, the first circus to pass through Charlottetown in twenty years meant that all the hotels were booked and no one was actually working at the wharf. Nevertheless, the Canadians made themselves very cozy aboard their ship.

Province House in Charlottetown, wherein the proceedings proceeded.

Ostensibly, they were there only to observe. However, as the Conference unfolded, they inserted themselves into the discussion more and more, wooing the other delegates and turning the proceedings towards the unification of all the British North American provinces.

So what does this have to do with beer?

Well—politics and alcohol in the 1800s rarely lay far apart. As we saw in the case of the Red Lion Inn and the Upper Canada Rebellion, taverns functioned as political meetings. Groups met, debated, and voted in taverns. Deals were ironed out over drinks; alliances announced and cemented through toasting. Even at modern conferences, business goes down at the bar.

George Brown: politician, newspaper editor, not a beer fan.

What’s more, the 1860s delegates used this socializing as a means of building relationships—and thus furthering their goal. A general session welcomed the Canadian crew on Friday, September 2nd. On the 3rd, the Canadians reciprocated with a champagne lunch. According to one source I found, they’d brought nearly $13,o00 worth (in today’s money, obviously). As George Brown wrote to his wife:

“Cartier and I made eloquent speeches — of course — and whether as the result of our eloquence or of the goodness of our champagne, the ice became completely broken, [and] the tongues of the delegates wagged merrily…”

(Two things. One: George Brown was a temperance advocate, but one assumes he saw the practicalities of not lecturing about alcohol in that moment. Two: I love the “of course” he inserts in there: so, so very much.)

An article in Brown’s newspaper shows that one conference member took the notion of relation-building to another level:

[He said,] “If any one can show just cause or impediment why these colonies should not be united in matrimonial alliance, let him no express it, or forever after hold his peace.” There was no response. “Then,” said he, “ere my days on earth, which are comparatively few, shall close, I may yet witness the conclusion of the ceremony and hear them pronounced man and wife.” (The Globe, September 16, 1864)

The Conference wrapped up on the 7th, at which point the original plan for a Maritime union had been scrapped in favour of joining with the Province of Canada. The delegates agreed to meet in Québec City the following month, one more ball was held, and then everyone went home.

Group photo taken on the portico. John A is sitting down, near the centre (by his pals Thomas D’Arcy McGee and George-Étienne Cartier. John A looks a little tired.

Historian J.M.S. Careless sums it up perfectly in his biography, Brown of the Globe: “There, in the chief stateroom of the Queen Victoria, amid the wineglasses and cigar smoke, 23 men had warmly agreed to found a new nation. Other states might have a more dramatic start — but few, surely, a more enjoyable one.”